A new report by the Second Congressional Commission on Education (EDCOM 2) sent worries anew as
the number of functionally illiterate Filipinos nearly doubled to 24.8 million in the past 30 years.
Described by the Commission as the “inability to understand and apply basic reading, writing, and numeracy skills in daily life,” functional illiteracy has become a growing national concern despite the reconstruction of the once Department of Education, Culture and Sports (DECS), into what is now the Department of Education (DepEd), Commission on Higher Education (CHED), and Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA).
According to the Filipino Times, the restructuring – intended to allow DepEd to focus on improving functional literacy – has made their priorities “scattered,” pointing out that they are involved in more than 261 interagency bodies, which “diverted the Agency’s focus from its core mandate of basic education.”
EDCOM 2 executive director Karol Mark Yee shared that additional mandates for teaching personnel, such as implementing vision screening, managing feeding programs, and acting as Disaster Risk Reduction and Management coordinators “have burdened both the agency and schools.”
These added responsibilities, Yee said, have aggravated the deficit of support staff in schools, forcing teaching to absorb ancillary and administrative work, and that non-teaching tasks take up significant time and affect instructional quality and learning outcomes.
Meanwhile, Senator Sherwin Gatchalian expressed his insights on the new revelation, saying that “we will not resolve the country’s education crisis if many Filipinos remain functionally illiterate.”
“Mobilizing local government units is one of the strategies I have been proposing to boost functional literacy,” he said, adding that he has filed a proposed National Literacy Council Act, which designates local school boards as the de facto local literacy councils in their respective provinces, cities, and municipalities.
14.5 million Filipinos were listed as functionally illiterate by the EDCOM 2 in 1993.
